Joe Rogan - Jordan Peterson: Games Are Microcosms of Reality

It's one of the reasons why they like to use golf as a method. Yes, exactly. That's exactly right. Because golf is two things. One, you get to see how someone handles competition. You get to see if they cheat. Yeah. Because people do cheat in golf. You know, it's an interesting story. A good friend of mine, his dad was playing golf with this man and his wife was there as well. And the wife saw the dad move the, or saw this man that he was playing golf with move the ball. And she said, do not go into business with this man. Do not trust this man. He's a cheater. He cheated at golf. And he thought it was not that big a deal. It's like, it's just a game of golf. It's like, no, this is a big deal. Turns out the guy was a fucking criminal. It just took a while to find out. I mean, he wound up doing a lot of other things that how you do some things is oftentimes how you do everything. Yeah. Well, that's why people are so interested in games. Yes. You know, because games. Good to see who a person really is. Yeah. Well, games, this is again why I'm such an admirer of Piaget because he knew very well that game is a microcosm of reality. That's why we like, I mean, you have to have an explanation for why people like games. Yeah. You know, and I've been talking about this a lot in my lectures too, is you think, well, you know, any game, like any competitive game, soccer is a good example. It's basically a hunting game. Hey, because you're firing a projectile at a target. Okay. So the target's the goal and the projectile is the ball, but it doesn't matter. Is that so you have, you have teams that are figuring out how to hunt properly. And you think, well, to hunt properly, you have to put the ball in the net as many times as you possibly can. And so you organize yourself in a hierarchy to facilitate that. But then that's, that's not the whole story because you tell your kids, it doesn't matter whether you win or lose. It matters how you play the game. And the kids all freaked out about that because he doesn't know what you mean. And he says, well, what do you mean dad? I'm trying to supposed to try to win. And you say, I don't know what I mean, but it's, it's still true. But here's what you mean is that if you're in a league, you're not trying to win the soccer game. You're trying to win the soccer championship and to win the championship, you have to win a whole bunch of games and the rules to win a whole bunch of games. Aren't the same as the rules to win one game. You know, like you could go flat out as the prima donna and bend and bend the rules and cut corners and exhaust everyone and win the game and then lose the next three because that's a stupid medium to long-term strategy. Or you could be like the superstar and hog the ball all the time and never give your teammates a chance to develop, but then you're injured and your team is out. So those, that's a stupid strategy too. So you think, well, what you have to do to win the championship is that you have to organize your team so that the best players lead, but that everybody gets developed and that you play the medium to long-term game in a fair way, in a fair and decent way. Okay. And so you think, well, that's how you win a championship. I talked to a coach a while back and he said, one of the things he did to select athletes was to watch what happened when they scored a goal. And if they were celebrating on their own, you know, in sort of an egotistical way, then that wasn't such a good sign. But if they scored a goal or touchdown or whatever it was and their entire team came in and bombed them and then like lifted them up on their shoulders and they thought that guy is an athlete. Because not only can he put the goal, put the ball in the net, but he does it in a way that benefits the entire team. And that's the person you want around for the long run. And so then the goal isn't just to put the ball in the goal. The goal is to put the ball in the goal, the largest number of times while simultaneously benefiting as many of your fellow players as you can. Well, although I think that's a great strategy, I don't think that's necessarily the meaning of it doesn't matter if you win or lose. It's how you play the game. I don't think people think of it in terms of like a long term strategy for championship leagues. I think when they're saying it doesn't matter whether you win or lose, it's how you play the game. Meaning don't cheat. Do your best and learn. Learn from your endeavor. That's right. Well, learn how to handle failure. Learn how to handle victory. Well, also learn from the experience itself. Like if you make a mistake and you're trying your hardest, but you make an error because someone has a counter to that, then you learn from that. That is how you play the game. If you play stupidly and you don't think and you win just because you got lucky, that's not as good as playing intelligently and expanding your skills and losing because the other people are superior and then you learn from the fact that they figured out a way to have solutions to all the problems that you presented. Yes, okay. So one of the things that you're pointing out is that while you're playing, you want to be expanding your range of skills so that you get better at playing the next game. But then you think, well, even the soccer championship isn't the whole game because your life is a whole series of games of championships of different types. The idea is that championships will come if you continue to excel and get excellent. Yes, and also if people invite you to play. So those are the two things. So that's the goal. The goal isn't to put the ball in the net. The goal is to get excellent and to be invited to play. And the mechanism is that you put the ball in the goal. And that makes sense. See, that helps explain why people find competitive sports so unbelievably compelling because you can be cynical about it and you can say, well, look, there's 50,000 people there watching somebody kick a spheroid object into a net. Who the hell cares? But that's not the issue. What you are in fact doing is you're going there to watch people develop expertise and to learn to play reciprocally in a noble and ethical manner. And all of that sport, when it's done properly, is a direct physical incarnation of that ethic.